On the morning side of the mountain....... come January 2010, my Alma Mater, is getting ready, possibly for the hugest reunion of baby boomers ever organized. And....on the twilight side of the hill....... not to be left out, within mirror-flashing distance (remember Rekha), the alumni ladies of similar bent (Sacred Heart Convent) are gung–hoing alongside.
And look at the programme line-up; it’s a stroll down memory lane as everyone becomes a tourist of his own youth. There’s even a cricket match in the offing where Alain Jason will seek once again to recapture his youth to see if he can still stand tall behind the wicket and remain hidden.
I first got involved in organized sports when I joined school at a tender age, when because of boarding school law I had to be a member of one of three houses. We played cricket, hockey and football and assorted blood-thirsty activities on those playing fields. Some, where one had to hit, catch, throw, or kick balls of different sizes. Most of us juniors could do none of those things.
Oh, there were the occasional exceptions like the fast-developing Iraqis with huge amounts of adolescent hormones, and thick moustaches sprouting from their bodies, who could throw a ball upwards of Mach 3 speeds , but with no idea whatsoever where it would go. When playing cricket these kind of guys always got to bowl, which presented a real problem for us kids. The wicket-keeper got to wear large gloves and protective ankle and knee pads, and the umpire got to hide behind the opposite wicket. But all we batters had was a cracked piece of wood that sometimes slipped out of our sweaty palms.
I hated to bat. I used to pray that it would start raining, or that there would be an earthquake to stop the game before my turn came. I became very close to God. But most often He would let me down and I would have to bat. The team captain would be yelling idiot advice in the background like, “Cover your wicket.”It was easy for him to say: he was out of harm’s way.
I on the other hand made no effort to cover the wicket. My only occupation was avoiding death. I would stand there holding my breath and when the prematurely large Iraqi let go of the ball, I would swing out blindly with the bat in the hopes of hitting the ball so that it would not smash into my body.
Usually I was clean bowled, which was good, because I could then go back to the safety of the pavilion, and encourage the team captain to send out another terrified kid to cover the wicket.
I much preferred fielding, especially in the 3rd man position. If the batter got a hit and the ball got past the wicket keeper, all of the three slips and the gully, you could pretend to run like a maniac, so that by the time the ball landed you could be several feet away and safe.
Thus I learned about the adage of “Sportsmanship” which says: Never participate in anything that can do you bodily harm. Football and hockey were other great examples where players are urged to run into each other at high speeds and take the ball away from their opponent by kicking them or hitting them on their shins with a stick.
So instead I indulged in minor vandalism such as raiding the garden and sticking chewing gum on the head of the kid lining up in front of me at the refectory. But when I got to high school, I discovered that you had to be good at some sport in order to be called on stage during the annual awards and get a silver cup or medal with your name engraved on it.
Everyone in school attached a lot of importance to those silver cups and medals. You could be an imbecile of astonishing magnitude, but if you had a silver cup or a medal, you were bound to succeed in life.
Oh, the school administration made it sound as if academic achievements were important too. They’d have Annual Days, where they’d call the studious kids up on stage and present them with more books on philosophy and national history. But the kid who walked up with the logarithm tables dangling from his belt to receive his math achievement award did not impress the rest. No, to make in my school you had to get a silver cup or a medal, which meant you had to go out for a sport.
So I went in for the long jump, because all it took was having to run about 30 feet and land in a bed of soft sand.
I spent a happy 6 months, leaping into soft sand and dreaming of my silver cup. Then one day there was the school sports and I entered my name. That proved to be my downfall, because it turns out that they measure how far you jump and only the three longest jumpers get points. I was not one of the three. I was not one of the ten. In fact they could have pulled lame patients out of a hospital, and they would have probably jumped farther than I did.
So that was the end of my involvement with sports. Fortunately, there were other avenues to being popular in school, which involved jumping over the wall to go to the nearest dhaba to eat dosas, getting caught, and caned at morning assembly in full view of hundreds of admiring boys. Thus achieving social acceptance.
After high school, I discovered that silver cups and medals become less important than academics. Think about it, if you attend a corporate cocktail dinner junket and subtly try to flash your silver cup, people will think you’re a moron; whereas if you subtly try to flash your Cornell credentials, people will still think you’re a moron, but an educated one.
I often wonder what I would do if I had a silver cup. Maybe use it for drinking beer. 
